Do you not think it's well... a bit odd? The fact that the world has suddenly grown fat in a single generation? Since the explosion of gyms, low-fat foods, calorie counting and government healthy eating advice, 1 in 4 people in Britain are obese, and 2 in 3 are overweight. What's going wrong?

It's all about malnutrition. Once you get your head around that idea, obesity and all its related problems start making sense. Need to lose weight? Simple. Or maybe you've got gallstones? Well, as I'm finding out, that's not so simple.
Like any blog, this is all a work in progress, but if you're going to start anywhere, 2 minute summary is as good as any.

If fat people need to eat less, and body fat is a source of fuel, why do fat people need to eat anything at all? Wouldn’t they just be best of starving themselves until they fit back in the same jeans they wore when they were in their late teens? In the 1960s and 70s, that’s exactly how they treated obesity – bed rest and a bit of chicken broth. So why the sudden need for diet industries, diet foods, diet obsessions and diet doctors? It can’t all be driven by the circulation of the Daily Mail. Whatever happened with the obvious way of dieting – to stop eating?

Alright, it’s been a while – again. I was going to write some easy hit pieces how UK has fought off hefty competition to gain the award of the fattest women in Europe (go Team GB!). Too easy. Or on the US congress ruling resulting from lobbying lowlifes that deigned pizzas to be a vegetable that can be served daily in school canteens. Too obvious. Or the scientific research revealing that a toast sandwich is the best meal for an austerity Britain. Too dumb. Then I caught up properly on the recent posts from Taubes, Guyenet and Stanton and it spurred me to write the final chapter of this blog.

When’s the last time you were properly patronised? I mean really patronised in a fully condescending fashion, as if you were some kind of dribbling village idiot that sits at home playing with fireworks and cans of petrol? It’s been a while for me, but someone stepped up to the job with real talent – none other than the Chief Medical Officer for the UK presenting the new obesity strategy. I say presenting – I really mean telling off the UK for being a bunch of greedy feckless chubsters. If you’ve not seen it, cop a load of Dame Sally Davies endearing herself to the country.

In North East India, there’s been a rapid rise in cases of gallstones. And obesity. Sound familiar? It should do, as we’re seeing a live recreation of the same problem that beset the Pima Indians in the early 1900s that turned them from athletic hunter gatherers into the one of the most obese groups on the planet. And we should be paying attention, because the true cause of obesity and all its related ills is intertwined in this one thorny area.

What week is it? Yeah, I know, 3rd week of August. Yeah yeah, Tripoli is undergoing a revolution. And OK, Steve Jobs has stepped down from Apple, the economy is yo-yoing, and some Brits are still mumbling about a ‘broken society’ which is a catch all for any problem we don’t have an easy answer for. But through all the news, this week is really important, and you probably missed why.

Last night thousands of teenagers got together to play out Grand Theft Auto across the UK for real. Contain your rage for a minute (I’m struggling to be fair), try not to look at the global financial collapse that’s slowly unwinding across Europe, and turn your attention to the work of Bonnie Bassler who’s studying how bacteria communicate. There could be a link between all three events…

Back in the 1970s, Lynn Margulis and Dorion Sagan put forward a theory in Microcosmos that bacteria weren’t so much at the bottom of the food chain in so much as the driving force for the world, and that we were merely vessels that carried around collections of bacteria. It built around Gaia theory from James Lovelock that nature could really be considered one single self-regulating organism.

Ah, doesn’t it make you nostalgic for the glorious days of the hippy 70s, when everyone listened to Janis Joplin, smoked copious amounts of gear and free love ruled hey? Except that these weren’t new age hippy types – Lovelock, scientist and ex NASA consultant, Margulis an acclaimed microbiologist (Richard Dawkins is fan) and Sagan, a renowned science writer. And what’s more, evidence is starting to come together that they might well be right.

Alright, I’m not going to do this that often, but given all the headlines are all about Murdoch’s crumbling empire (and not the ever so slightly more serious unfurling financial crisis in the EU/US), there’s been a flood of fat news that’s been swept aside by Rebekah Brooks’ copious red hair.

It’s been a big week for news. Huge. Lies, deceit and moral condemnation have been on the forefront of everyone’s mind as government officials trot out the same tired old clichés about doing what’s right, not just for our sakes but for the sakes of our children and generations to come. But say what you like, we've got a result, even if it's not the one we wanted ...

So, 9 months ago, I started this blog because I was convinced that malnutrition drives obesity, and as a side effect, gallstones. Given I knew nothing then, and a hell of a lot more now, does it still stack up? And while I lose an unholy amount of weight in a very short space of time, the experiment with gallstones failed, so how does the idea all hang together now? Read more...